April 1, 2022 Russia-Ukraine news

Around 2,000 civilians are on evacuation buses heading from the coastal city of Berdyansk to the Ukrainian government-held city of Zaporizhzhia, carrying civilians evacuating from the besieged city of Mariupol. 

"The evacuation convoy left Berdyansk for Zaporizhzhia," Mariupol city council said in a statement on Telegram. "Many private vehicles have joined the 42 buses escorted by Red Cross and SES (State Emergency Service) vehicles. Today we expect the arrival of a record number of Mariupol residents." 

Some background: Russia's ministry of defense said in a statement on Thursday that the Russian military would reopen the evacuation corridor from the besieged city of Mariupol to Zaporizhzhia on Friday at the request of French and German leaders.

The ministry's announcement came as Ukrainian officials said that humanitarian convoys ran into several issues on Thursday, including Russian troops confiscating aid and blocking buses.

Russian forces had confiscated 14 tons of humanitarian aid from buses bound for Melitopol in southern Ukraine, according to Ukranian minister Iryna Vereshchuk.

Vereshchuk said the food and medication was loaded on 12 buses. She added that Russian forces also blocked 45 buses going to Berdyansk on Thursday en route to Mariupol, where about 100,000 civilians remained trapped.

CNN's Nathan Hodge and Hira Humayun contributed reporting to this post.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian called for intensified military, financial and humanitarian support for Ukraine, while talking to reporters in Tallinn, Estonia.

“Russia must not hope to win,” Le Drian said. “The stakes for us are strategic.”

Le Drian said that France wants to show to partners “on every continent” that “because the Russian war in Ukraine is the negation of the principles and commitments that protect us all, it is everyone’s business.”

He also warned against trusting promises of a reduction in fighting, saying, "We can only judge acts and for the moment we are not there."

He also reiterated calls for Europe to divest from Russian hydrocarbons.

“While we don’t all have the same dependence on Russian hydrocarbons, we will have the same interest in exiting them (in Europe).”

Le Drian has been on a tour of Finland, Estonia, and Lithuania since Wednesday. 

Some background: The minister's comments come two days after he told CNN there has been little progress in Russia-Ukraine talks.

In an interview with CNN’s Christiane Amanpour, Le Drian said there was “nothing new” and “no breakthrough” in what has been discussed at negotiations in Istanbul.

He added that “the issues are still the same” and that Russian President Putin “still wishes to impose his diktat on Ukraine.”

Le Drian said that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky “wants some security guarantees to be given to his country and at the moment there is nothing like that in the discussion.” 

At least 153 children have been killed in Ukraine since the start of the Russian invasion five weeks ago, and more than 245 children have been injured, the country’s general prosecutor's office said in news release Friday. 

Bombing and shelling have also damaged 859 educational institutions, including 83 that have been "completely destroyed," according to the news release. 

The Ukrainian general prosecutor's office said it is still working to establish the total number of child casualties in Mariupol as well as in some areas of Kyiv, Chernihiv and Luhansk regions.

Speaking on Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov thanked India for "taking this situation in its entirety of facts" during a meeting with Indian Foreign Minister S. Jaishankar.

“We appreciate that India is taking this situation in its entirety of facts, not just in a one-sided way,” Lavrov said at the conference in New Delhi on Friday.

“Our Western colleagues would like to reduce any meaningful international issue to the crisis in Ukraine, you know our position, we do not hide anything,” Lavrov added.

S. Jaishankar said the meeting was taking place “in a difficult international environment,” adding that India “has always been in favor of resolving differences and disputes through dialogue and diplomacy.”

Lavrov said economic matters and the ongoing coronavirus pandemic would also be on the agenda.

Some background: Lavrov's meeting with S. Jaishankar came hot on the heels of his summit with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on Wednesday.

Both India and China have been under pressure to condemn Russia's actions in Ukraine as the death toll from the unprovoked conflict rises. They have refused to condemn Russia's brutal invasion outright, and both abstained from voting on United Nations resolutions demanding Moscow immediately stop its attack on Ukraine.

However, by the end of Lavrov's first day in China, Beijing had made its stance clear. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said there is "no ceiling for China-Russia cooperation," according to state-run news agency Xinhua.

Meanwhile, there has also been a flurry of diplomatic activity involving India recently. Earlier this month, leaders from Japan and Australia held summits with their Indian counterparts. Also this week, diplomats from Germany and the European Union are visiting Delhi.

And Lavrov's trip coincides with the visits of Britain's Foreign Secretary Liz Truss and the United States' Deputy National Security Advisor for International Economics, Daleep Singh.

CNN's Jessie Yeung contributed reporting to this post.

Russian forces have not allowed aid supplies to reach the besieged city of Mariupol, an adviser to the city's mayor said Friday, and it remains exceptionally difficult for trapped residents to leave the city.

Some context: Ukrainian minister Iryna Vereshchuk said about 100,000 civilians remained trapped in the city, which has suffered weeks of bombardment. Russian forces also blocked 45 buses en route to Mariupol on Thursday, she added.

Russia said it will reopen the evacuation corridor from Mariupol to Zaporizhzhia at 10 a.m. Moscow time Friday at the request of French and German leaders, according to the Russian Ministry of Defense. France said the evacuation corridor on Thursday was “insufficient” to allow rescue from Mariupol.

Several towns in Ukraine's eastern Luhansk region have been hit by "heavy shelling" from Russian forces, the regional military governor said on Friday.

Some of the towns and cities struck include Severodonetsk, Rubizhne, Lysychansk, Kreminna and Ivanivka, Serhii Haidai, the head of the Luhansk regional military administration said in a statement.

Ukrainian forces had also fought off attempts by Russian troops to bypass their positions near the settlements of Popasna and Novotoshkivske, Haidai said in a separate statement.

Some context: Ukrainian military governors in the country's east also reported heavy shelling on Thursday amid an apparent shift by the Russian military to redirect military efforts to the Donbas region. Haidai said earlier this week efforts had been underway to evacuate civilians from small towns in his region, even without such agreements with the Russian side.

Ukraine's deputy defense minister said Russia is "trying to concentrate" missile systems in southeastern Belarus for potential use against Ukraine.

The assessment comes despite Russia's recent claims of a de-escalation around Kyiv and the northern city of Chernihiv.

Ukrainian forces are seeing Russian missile systems being sent near Gomel city in Belarus, Maliar said.

Asked if she expected to see continued missile strikes on Ukrainian territory, Maliar said, "We have to be ready for this. The war continues. And it should be said that the enemy is not slowing down. Rocket attacks, their intensity is all the same as it was, sometimes even increasing."

Some context: NATO's chief warned that Russian forces are not withdrawing, but are repositioning as they maintain pressure on Kyiv and other cities. Ukrainian and US officials have also said Russians may be regrouping in Belarus.

Western intelligence agencies are waging a psychological war over Ukraine directly with Russian President Vladimir Putin, an expert at the genre, who is now effectively taking a dose of his own medicine.

The United States and its allies are painting a picture of a bogged down, demoralized and dysfunctional Russian military taking disastrous losses on the battlefield, and are simultaneously conjuring a vision of growing political tension inside the Kremlin.

They claim the Russian leader is isolated, poorly advised and lacking real intelligence on just how badly the war is going.

Western governments are preventing Putin from defining the narrative of the war.

It is a tough position for a Russian leader who has often deployed information warfare himself, notably while meddling in US and European elections.

The remarkable detail of the declassified intelligence assessments must also be especially galling to Putin, a former KGB officer and intelligence chief. And they leave open the possibility that Western intelligence agencies have the capacity to see deep into the Kremlin's war effort and internal politics, which is likely to infuriate the Russian leader and could open further cracks in his regime.

Read the full analysis here:

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Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov — who arrived in New Delhi on Thursday — is set to meet with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday, according to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Russia.

A senior Indian government official familiar with preparations for the talks said Modi will reiterate and stress the need for a cessation of hostilities and sovereignty as inviolable.

Lavrov will also meet Indian external affairs minister S. Jaishankar.

View from the US: Ahead of Lavrov’s visit to India, US State Department spokesperson Ned Price told reporters that every country has its own relationship with Russia.

UK Foreign Secretary Elizabeth Truss also met with Jaishankar on Thursday, repeatedly pointing out how countries across the world have stepped up in denouncing Russia’s attack on Ukraine.

Some context: India has declined to take a stance on the conflict in Ukraine and has abstained from multiple United Nations votes. India has welcomed several foreign leaders to the country this week with various discussions on Ukraine.

Read more about Lavrov's visits to China and India here:

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Analysis: Russian Foreign Minister visits China and India under shadow of Ukraine war